I don’t understand it either, but it’s like some sort of Hogwarts—Star Wars voodoo where all the 5G innerweb technology opens the gate to much more than TikTok videos.

Seeing a college student use snail mail is about as likely as seeing one of them talking on their phone. But by Socrates, if you need a snail mail envelope, there’s one in there.

Me? I can’t draw water from a well. I want to; I try to, but…well…let’s just say I’m in awe of those who can and leave it at that.

Admit it, anyone and everyone who has managed to manifest into this corporeal form did at least a couple of idiotic things as a youth.

Him, a voodoo priestess, a gender fluid Philosophy major, a truck driver from Santee, a plus-sized model named Maude—she works part-time in the cafeteria over to the school, a goat named Penelope, and a quiet, skinny girl named Lucy all came to the house for Thanksgiving dinner.

We move forward in shades of yin and yang, good and bad suspended in some weird balance.

If you’ve not attended class since the first week of the semester, what is the thought process that convinces you it’s a good idea to come take the final exam?

“…that couldn’t possibly be “true.” Nobody’d do that. Yeah, they would.”

Once these budding Einsteins regain minimal cognitive function, the emails…and on rare occasion, the office visits…begin.

“Gravity sucks. We’ll figure out the rest.”

The smell of oiled leather gloves, the sound of a ball popping into the pocket, the sting of making contact at the plate, the rituals, the superstitions, the stats, the strategy, I loved all of it.

My boss, Dukar Kaiser, whose 3-year-old son learned English watching Cheech and Chong movies (even had the accents right) called the layoffs “being promoted to the fresh air.”

…my “careers” have been:  dishwasher, sold shoes, drove a forklift, musician, window washer,  cube jockey, auctioneer, real estate broker, self-employed business owner, teacher, writer, and countless side hustles.

…for those of you who’ve been out of college a while—yes, Thursday night is still the go-to party night and yes, early Friday mornings still feature the Walk of Shame Parade.

I was between marriages and headed to the grocery store for single guy staples: beer, butter, beef jerky, one-ply toilet paper, beer, and tater chips.

“…the whole car came off the ground and when it landed my whole right side SMASHED into the car (I was in the trunk). “

When I’d done something really stupid, which was almost daily, Pop would shake his head and proclaim, “if you put your brain on a razor blade it’d look like a BB rolling down a four-lane highway,” and he was right in a metaphorical sort of way.

“Want a peak behind the glamourous professor’s curtain to see how the magic happens? Let’s unpack this email to learn the scholarly considerations that led to my response.”